


The Name of the Wind

by thesearchforbluejello



Category: Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: Angst, Episode: s05e06 Timeless, F/M, that scene has haunted me forever okay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-23
Updated: 2017-12-23
Packaged: 2019-02-19 06:51:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 477
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13118364
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesearchforbluejello/pseuds/thesearchforbluejello
Summary: "It had settled in her hair like snow."





	The Name of the Wind

**Author's Note:**

> I'll never get over that hallway scene. Un-beta'd, so there's probably at least one typo.

He thought about that moment every day, for a very long time. And then he buried it deep, swallowing down the pain like a bitter pill until it was just a residual taste on his tongue that was easier to ignore.

But now, after all these years and all this fragile hope, they stand on Voyager's frozen hull, white suits bleeding into the background of snow and ice, dissolving into the blinding sky. He traces the shape of the words with his eyes, upside-down from where he stands, the only real identifier of the crumpled, shattered wreckage that is the last remains of the ship they'd called home.

He expects a bitter, scathing remark from Harry, but to Chakotay's surprise he's silent. The only sound is the wind scraping across the ice of Voyager's grave, and he shuts his eyes against the sound of her voice rising, unbidden, on the wind. 

She'd given a speech, laced with pride and excitement and hope and he's forgotten her words but the wind remembers her voice.

Harry moves and the sound of ice crunching underfoot is the sound of a champagne bottle shattering against the railing in Engineering as B'Elanna christened the new slipstream drive. He looks away from the words and the sparkling, glittering, shining ice is the confetti, reflecting with the light of the warp core as it flutters down, flickering.

It had settled in her hair like snow.

The memory of the universe's cruel foreshadowing creeps up like a vine curling around him, squeezing, crushing, suffocating him until tears are freezing on his lashes and the world is an indefinite, indifferent kaleidoscope of white. 

The wind carves into the snow, breathing eddies of powder into the air before settling it again across Voyager's name.

He thinks of the confetti in her hair like snow, casting auburn into red, and of her smile in the hallway, when he'd had hope because he hadn't known then that was the last time he'd ever see her.

Tessa's voice cuts across the coms and through his thoughts; Harry answers in clipped words he ignores. He wishes, for the thousandth time, that she hadn't come. He'd never been a man to give anything less than all of himself, but ever since half of his heart went down with Voyager, he's found that it was no longer possible. He cares about Tessa-- that much isn't a debate. But somewhere, distantly, he is bothered by the fact that he'll never love her, and he'll certainly never be able to love her the way she loves him. He's locked this feeling away every day, and he clamps the lid tighter still for knowing what they'll find when they walk onto the bridge.

"Let's go," he says to Harry, and walks back across Voyager's frozen hull chased by the sound of her voice on the wind.


End file.
